


Cooking up a storm

by DaiseeChain



Series: The Elementals [4]
Category: Harry Potter - Fandom
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-16
Updated: 2010-07-16
Packaged: 2017-11-01 22:51:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/362144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaiseeChain/pseuds/DaiseeChain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The twins are in the kitchen, cooking something up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cooking up a storm

**Author's Note:**

> **Written For:** [Crucio](http://community.livejournal.com/hp_uk_meetup/) giftbag.  
>  **Recipient:** [](http://groolover.livejournal.com/profile)[**groolover**](http://groolover.livejournal.com/)  
>  **Element:** Fire  
> 

 

 

The trio were engaged to run interference to allow Fred and George to carry out their work. It took some doing, but eventually they had the kitchen to themselves. Of course they had to work fast as Molly could always be counted on to find some excuse to come back to the stove or sink.

“Eggs?” George asked.

“Check.” Fred peered at the eggs in the basket as if waiting for them to explode.

“Flour?”

“Check.” Fred examined the cloth bag and found it to indeed contain flour.

“Sugar?”

Fred rummaged in a drawer, found a teaspoon, scooped up white granules and tasted them gingerly. Then he enthusiastically tipped the rest onto his tongue. “Shick,” he mumbled around the mouthful.

George frowned at him. “Was that necessary?”

“Might have been salt,” Fred shrugged.

George blinked. “Good point.” He found another teaspoon and tried it for himself. After swallowing he also pronounced it to be sugar.

“I already told you that!”

“Yeah. But it never hurts to double check.”

“True. Good thinking.” The clock ticked softly several times on the wall behind them. “Think we should triple check?”

George shook his head. “Stay focused. Mum might be back any minute.”

“Okay. What else do we need?”

“Well, the cooker’s already... cooking. So I guess we need a recipe?”

They searched the kitchen till they found the book of Molly’s favourite baking ideas, stuffed inside a drawer crammed with recipe cards and magazines. As they thumbed through years of handwritten scrawls, notes slipped out and flitted to the floor. Once they’d found the right recipe they set the utensils measuring, pouring and mixing till the batter looked more or less the right consistency - they figured a few lumps couldn’t make that much difference - then poured the result into a tin and shoved it into the cooker.

George scratched his head. “How do we know when it’s done?”

“Says here,” said Fred, who was idly flipping through the book, “that it should take about 25 minutes and that we’re to ‘test it with a skewer’ to make sure.”

They looked at each other. “Nah,” they said in unison.

Out the cake came from the oven, to be charmed to call out to them when it was properly cooked. Then back it went again, to get busy rising and scenting the room, while they set about the important work: the decoration.

They’d debated long and hard about this. There was no point in trying to compete with their Mother. She could out-decorate anyone they knew. This had to be something altogether different.

 

 

 

Forty minutes later they were done. Fred checked that everyone was out at the table where they’d promised they’d be. “C’mon brother. It’s show time.”

George flicked a hovering charm at their creation and followed Fred out the door.

Molly’s face when she saw the cake was priceless, quickly followed by suspicious. “What have you done?”

“Happy unbirthday!” the twins chorused. The cry was taken up shambolically by assembled family and guests.

Molly looked around the table. “I... I don’t understand.”

“It’s easy, Mum,” Ron said, ambling up and putting his arm over her shoulder. “Everyone agreed that you could do with some cheering up. And the twins have baked you a cake.”

“But you don’t know how to cook!”

“I’m sure they did just fine, dear.” Despite his reassuring words, Arthur looked at the cake a bit dubiously.

“Really? Then why is it on fire?”

“It’s not on fire, Mum!” Fred was indignant.

“Honestly, Mum,” said George. “Put your glasses on. And be quick about it. This hovering charm’s running out and the cake’s getting heavy.”

Molly scrambled to get her glasses off her head and on to her face. “It’s a sun! A miniature sun!”

Fred nodded at George and they hovered the cake to the table, passing it dangerously close to Ginny’s head, and plunked it down just as the Leviosa ran out. The sun wobbled a bit, singeing Ron’s eyebrows when he leaned in to get a closer look.

“Ow!” Ron rubbed his forehead.

“That’ll teach you to be nosey.” Fred said.

“No it won’t.” Ginny shot back. “He’s had 16 years to learn and he hasn’t got it right yet.”

“True.” George pulled his wand out of his apron pocket and prodded the sun back into position. It flared slightly in protest, melting one of the fondant roses into a puddle.

Molly, flapping her hands in front of her face, fought back tears.

“Well, that wasn’t the response we were hoping for.” Fred watched cautiously as Arthur conjured up a hanky for Molly.

Mopping at the tears on her cheeks and chin, Molly sputtered. “It’s... it’s just so lovely! I never expected...” A fresh wave of tears burst forth and Arthur pulled her in for a hug.

Her children, Harry, and Hermione all looked at each other with raised eyebrows. Ginny shrugged. “Oh well. If she’s not going to have some, I will.”

“No, no!” Molly pulled free of Arthur and rushed over. “I will cut my own cake, thank you very much.” She picked up the cake knife, then paused as the heat of the miniature sun warmed her knuckles. “Er, Fred? George? Perhaps you could do the honours. Just this once.”

 

 

 

 

An hour later, though much of the cake had been devoured and pronounced excellent by Molly and barely edible by everyone else, there was still a sizeable portion of it left and the sun was showing no signs of going down.

Arthur yawned, stretched, and stood. “Well, as pleasant as this afternoon has been, I have a meeting to get to.” He waved his finger at Ron, who subsided sulkily and bit down on the obvious question of whom he was meeting. “Don’t forget to tidy this lot away.”

The lull after his Disapparation was filled with contented conversation, until that too lapsed in favour of silent digestion.

Eventually Hermione blinked sleepily at the centrepiece and remarked, “That really is quite impressive, you know. How have you kept the charm going for so long?”

“It’s supposed to set into the middle of the cake,” Fred said, glumly prodding the fireball with a spoon.

Harry looked up at the overcast sky. “Well, at least there’s one tiny ray of sunshine today.”

“Leave it, Ron.” Ginny slapped his hand as Ron picked up a fork to try and fling the little sun around. “It’s hot. It could hurt someone.”

Ron made a face, but put his fork down anyway. “Where’d Mum go?”

Hermione dabbed her napkin at her lips. “She went to clean up the mess she said Fred and George would have inevitably made of her kitchen.” She frowned at the twins. “You did clean up after yourselves, didn’t you?”

Fred puffed up. “Of course we did!”

“One thing we learned in the shop is that you can’t leave your experiments lying around, messing the place up.”

Fred nodded in agreement. “You never know what they’ll spontaneously get up to of their own accord.”

Sated and sedated by all the food, no one had the energy to do anything but watch as a lone dragonfly flitted around the table, buzzing lazily past the lemonade, although they made certain it didn’t burn itself on any miniature solar flares. For several minutes the only sound was the drone of the lone insect, on a soporific Summer’s afternoon.

Molly’s voice bellowing from the kitchen window shattered the peace. “Fred and George Weasley! Come here this instant!”

The twins exchanged worried glances.

Ginny sighed. “Well, we all knew it was too good to be true. What have you two done now?”

Fred’s brow furrowed. “George?”

George’s eyes narrowed at the tone of his brother’s voice. “Yes?”

“Did you remember to put the damping charm on the spell?”

Harry stepped in to fill the silence left by George’s lack of response. “What’s a damping charm?”

“They’re used to offset the side-effects of certain spells,” Hermione said, eyeing the cake suspiciously. “You know, balance out universal harmony.”

“You mean, like, for every action there’s an equal and opposite reaction?” Harry too was now looking carefully at the cake.

“Well, they use different wording in the wizarding world, but... Oh no!” Hermione fixed George with a steady gaze. “Surely you didn’t-”

“Sorry Herm,” said Fred rising swiftly and in perfect synchronicity with George, “but we have to go.”

“Urgent business back at the shop.” George finished the explanation as they stepped away from the table. There was a loud pop and they both Disapparated just as a bedraggled Molly burst through the back door into the garden.

She was soaking wet; red hair plastered unflatteringly to her face, woolly jumper sagging under the weight of all the liquid it had sponged up, and in her wake she left a trail of water, as though she was a small travelling waterfall. “Why is there a monsoon in my kitchen?” she wailed, looking around for the source of the trouble.

Ginny wisely hid her laughter behind her hand, while Harry did a good impression of Hedwig, eyes wide and blinking. Hermione stood, wand already at the ready. “It’s okay, Mrs Weasley. We can easily fix this.”

“That’s easy for you to say, dear!” Molly wiped her hands over face in a futile effort to keep the water from dripping into her eyes, then gave up and slumped. “They’re not your children. They keep coming back.”

“Mum!” Ron and Ginny chorused.

Harry laughed. “C’mon. Let’s give your Mum a hand getting the mess cleaned up.”

“Well, I suppose if nothing else it’ll give us a good excuse to eat more cake later.” Ginny stood and pulled at a reluctant Ron’s arm, till he gave in and ungraciously allowed himself to be dragged away from the food. They ran, laughing, into the hurricane in the kitchen, following Molly and Hermione who were already busy counteracting the spell.

Behind them, as the dragonfly meandered on its way, and icing dripped slowly off the cake, tiny rays magnified through half-empty glasses, scorching weathered wood, and smoke rose in lazy drifts from the gently smouldering table. The small sun blazed merrily on.


End file.
